Which schools, if any, excelled during the pandemic?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:LAMB

+1

LAMB’s virtual instruction was very good.

Haha. No it wasn’t. I’m PP above was referencing LAMB

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Lafayette got everyone back. That was huge.

Everyone, as in not a single person left out? That is impressive. I think they win.

Everyone who wanted a space. There were some grades - K I think -- that took longer, but I believe everyone who wanted to had a spot in the end.

And - no Zoom in a room except for specials.. Beginning in Term 4 core subjects were taught in person to in person students; virtual teachers taught virtual kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is a weird question.

DC is an extreme, extreme outlier nationally in its slowness in getting kids back in the classroom. Maybe the only place in the U.S. that did worse than DC was San Francisco.

And we're asking who excelled?

Daycares excelled. Private schools excelled. *All* other schools in DC failed miserably.

Perhaps, but whose whose fault was that?

Principals striving to reopen broadly and efficiently could only accomplish so much without strong support and clear directives from the top. I'm under the impression that admins, teachers and families at a DCSP ES EotP did their utmost to get all the kids back as soon as possible. However, they were largely stymied by weak support from the Chancellor, the Mayor, the city council and the WTU to do any better. They were also hamstrung by poor top-down plant/facilities management planning over the years. How many kids could our school's leaders bring back to a building that was at around 150% over capacity pre-pandemic per CDC guidelines re social distancing?

Pretty clearly, the school didn't fail us; the mismanaged system did in the usual toxic political environment.

agreed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Basis was incredible. Maybe even better than in person. Certainly not at all worse. I could not have been more impressed.

Agreed. Basis definitely rocked DL.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Basis was incredible. Maybe even better than in person. Certainly not at all worse. I could not have been more impressed.

+1

[Anonymous]

Lafayette.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:LAMB

+1

LAMB’s virtual instruction was very good.

Haha. No it wasn’t. I’m PP above was referencing LAMB

Gotta agree that it was sort of…uh…useless. I am not particularly blaming the teachers but I just think younger age groups can’t learn via DL. LAMB probably understood this but didn’t care (like every other school attempting education for younger ages via DL). So I was not impressed bc there could have been better acknowledgement of this and better methods to address it. At least in LAMB’s case, there was this wild lack of comprehension that parents work and can’t hover over children to make up for educational shortcomings. I don’t know what teachers/admin thought was possible, but it was weird how they expected parents to just make up for things with no resources other than a workbook supplied halfway through the year.

[Anonymous]

Wilson actually did an excellent job; the principal was constrained by the distancing and cohort rules, which basically screws high schools in terms of in-person learning; however, in terms of virtual learning, my DC had real, synchronous classes from 9:30-4pm, with a short break in between classes and a break for lunch four days per week. All of her teachers were engaged and the administration was responsive. I can think of only a few times that classes were canceled. While it was not what it would have been had she been in person, it was a solid year of education (as opposed to the disaster that was Deal)...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Basis was incredible. Maybe even better than in person. Certainly not at all worse. I could not have been more impressed.

Agreed. Basis definitely rocked DL.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:LAMB

+1

LAMB’s virtual instruction was very good.

Haha. No it wasn’t. I’m PP above was referencing LAMB

Gotta agree that it was sort of…uh…useless. I am not particularly blaming the teachers but I just think younger age groups can’t learn via DL. LAMB probably understood this but didn’t care (like every other school attempting education for younger ages via DL). So I was not impressed bc there could have been better acknowledgement of this and better methods to address it. At least in LAMB’s case, there was this wild lack of comprehension that parents work and can’t hover over children to make up for educational shortcomings. I don’t know what teachers/admin thought was possible, but it was weird how they expected parents to just make up for things with no resources other than a workbook supplied halfway through the year.

NP. Agree with all of this. I can’t even say I was hovering; it was full on sitting on him to be in front of the screen for even 30 minutes. I did find the apps thru Clever work well for us. But since I was essentially teaching everything anyway, we could have skipped the virtual lessons.
Where I think LAMB could have differentiated itself is with open communication, more check ins with parents, and creativity in pushing for more in person instruction. Oh, and maybe better designed survey questions. Or maybe, not misconstrued responses.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:LAMB

+1

LAMB’s virtual instruction was very good.

Haha. No it wasn’t. I’m PP above was referencing LAMB

Gotta agree that it was sort of…uh…useless. I am not particularly blaming the teachers but I just think younger age groups can’t learn via DL. LAMB probably understood this but didn’t care (like every other school attempting education for younger ages via DL). So I was not impressed bc there could have been better acknowledgement of this and better methods to address it. At least in LAMB’s case, there was this wild lack of comprehension that parents work and can’t hover over children to make up for educational shortcomings. I don’t know what teachers/admin thought was possible, but it was weird how they expected parents to just make up for things with no resources other than a workbook supplied halfway through the year.

NP. Agree with all of this. I can’t even say I was hovering; it was full on sitting on him to be in front of the screen for even 30 minutes. I did find the apps thru Clever work well for us. But since I was essentially teaching everything anyway, we could have skipped the virtual lessons.
Where I think LAMB could have differentiated itself is with open communication, more check ins with parents, and creativity in pushing for more in person instruction. Oh, and maybe better designed survey questions. Or maybe, not misconstrued responses.

Also more small differentiated groups, less useless one on ones for each one of 30 kids taking up all the teachers time, and no stupid powerpoints, the list goes on. When we parents stopped being able to hover over our kid to do all the assignments, which was meant to be most of the learning, none got done. Watching 2 30 minute classes per day, one of which had 30 kids in it was not learning.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wilson actually did an excellent job; the principal was constrained by the distancing and cohort rules, which basically screws high schools in terms of in-person learning; however, in terms of virtual learning, my DC had real, synchronous classes from 9:30-4pm, with a short break in between classes and a break for lunch four days per week. All of her teachers were engaged and the administration was responsive. I can think of only a few times that classes were canceled. While it was not what it would have been had she been in person, it was a solid year of education (as opposed to the disaster that was Deal)...

I have one at Wilson and one at Deal, and our experience of the two was similar, much as PP describes for Wilson. I wonder how much of the disparity in experience at Deal discussed on here comes down to team and (to a lesser extent) grade? My 7th grader had a very good year, with none of the teacher no-shows and other negative experiences I’ve read about on here; I feel like I also heard a lot more negative stories about 8th grade than 7th.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Basis was incredible. Maybe even better than in person. Certainly not at all worse. I could not have been more impressed.

+1

+2 and +3 (opining on both my kids’ grades)

[Anonymous]

None because there is no public data, just opinions.
We’ll see at the end of this coming school year which schools excelled as well as which ones are good at catching kids up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wilson actually did an excellent job; the principal was constrained by the distancing and cohort rules, which basically screws high schools in terms of in-person learning; however, in terms of virtual learning, my DC had real, synchronous classes from 9:30-4pm, with a short break in between classes and a break for lunch four days per week. All of her teachers were engaged and the administration was responsive. I can think of only a few times that classes were canceled. While it was not what it would have been had she been in person, it was a solid year of education (as opposed to the disaster that was Deal)...

I have one at Wilson and one at Deal, and our experience of the two was similar, much as PP describes for Wilson. I wonder how much of the disparity in experience at Deal discussed on here comes down to team and (to a lesser extent) grade? My 7th grader had a very good year, with none of the teacher no-shows and other negative experiences I’ve read about on here; I feel like I also heard a lot more negative stories about 8th grade than 7th.

yes, Deal 8th grade (on some teams) was a disaster. Also, school-wide the kids got only 3 hours of live instruction Mon/Thurs and 1.5 hours on Tues/Fri.
In comparison, my private school kid (and Wilson kids) got live instruction for 6+ hours a day.